Designing a Training Program in Track and Field Skills - Essay Example

Research Proposal about Designing a Training Program in Track & Field Skills for Elementary School Athletes CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION. Background to the Problem Devising a training programme in track and field for the Elementary level is an exciting project and important on so many levels. This is not because sports are essential but rather because children below the age of 6-11 years are also a valued part of school society. However, many coaches have tended to forget that children of between the ages 6-11 require significant training programs in order to advance their skills for future benefit. Many coaches concentrate on training youths of 15 years and above, but they tend to ignore children of 11 years and below. This is because they believe that children below age 6-11 years are still too young to be trained on track and field skills. Therefore, this project will focus on the training program for track and field skill development for elementary schools in the State of Kuwait. Young children of six to eleven years need a great deal of instruction and instruction of differing styles and qualities. Their instructors need to do a lot of encouraging and positive reinforcement as well as give them lots of chances to practice so as to enhance their skills in athletics. The teachers need to lay out good strategies that combine complicated and simple tasks in a systematic manner to improve the children’s abilities. Teachers, therefore, need to incorporate a variety of techniques such as demonstrations, peer-learning reception of feedback, progression of skills and equipment to make the process meaningful (Robertson 1932). Coaches determine to a great deal, whether the experience that the children have in athletics is negative or positive. Instructors also affect self-esteem of individual players. The instructors need to take into mind the abilities as well as the personality traits of the players (Athletics, 1985). A lot of research has been conducted on successful coaching, as well as on the personal attributes of coaches who have succeeded. This research has been published in journals, books as well as in Magazines articles. (McEwan and Barry 1988); such a publication is the American Sport Education Program. According to McCloskey (1999), a competent coach must include monitoring, as well as enhancing the skills of the athletes by motivating the athletes with a positive reinforcement. This reinforcement could be through helpful feedback by coaches to the athletes themselves. From one to sport the other, all these requirements apply. Sporting undertakings are valuable from different perspectives. In recent times there has been emphasis on exercise for health reasons (McEwan and Barry, 1988). Exercise improves our cardiovascular health, our flexibility, muscle strength and general body fitness. Despite the fact that fitness programs are not suitable for young children, sports are encouraged at any early age. Sports and other physical activities are said to give the children an opportunity to be inculcated with good behaviors at personal and social levels. This helps ward off negative behaviors and thoughts that the children might develop due to life stresses. People also participate in sports for enjoyment and for creating social alliances with others. The enjoyment comes from the ability to express oneself freely, engaging in challenging activities and the aspect of competition (Athletics, 1985). In addition, children taking active role in sports are critical and are associated with numerous beneficial aspects. Notably, training programmes have been established to give the children skills based on particular age group. From this perspective, age contributes to large part in ensuring providing specific training to a child a give age group (Hatcher, 2010). Obesity cases are on the rise among children and giving athletic training plays a significant role in reducing the menace across the age groups. Also, athletic training is highly associated with enhanced coordination as well as improved academic performance. Therefore, providing appropriate athletic training to children culminates in systematic development of a child in diverse aspects (Kraemer & Fleck, 2005). On this ground, the program will be geared towards improving endurance of a child body for both physical and psychological fitness. Problem Statement Sports and athletics are beneficial to human beings in a number of ways. They are beneficial to their health, important to the development of their social as well as personal behaviors and even a source of fun and enjoyment (McEwan and Barry 1988). Coaches are therefore called upon to design special programs that are suitable for the specific ages. Although a skills training program is vital for psychological health, designing a training program in track and skills for children between the ages of 6-11 years old will significantly advance the athletics skills of children and increase their opportunities for achieving competing teams in sports. Scope and Nature of the Project The scope of this project is to help physical education teachers in Kuwait elementary schools to teach, coach track and field skills development of children; thus make competition more fun and enjoyable. The study aims to design programs for children between ages six and eleven. It will also look at the relevance of the coaches to the children in terms of identifying what is relevant for the specific age bracket. Objectives of the Study 1) To find out how bespoke programmes will help physical education teachers in Kuwait elementary schools to teach, coach track and field skills; thus make their competing teams better. 2) To establish the importance of athletics to young children of ages 6 to 11 years. 3) To ascertain factors that affect effective teaching of young children. 4) To find out how the program will motivate children to participate. 5) To find out the benefits of the program for children health. 6) To identify whether the program is an enjoyable for children. Research Questions 1) What are the benefits of designing a training program in track and field skills for elementary school athletes? 2) What are the factors that may lead to the professional success of young athletes from the perspectives of teachers and coaches? Significance of the study The aim of this study is to improve teaching skills for the coaches and teachers of elementary school in athletics. The study will also benefit young children as the findings will enable the coaches to design a suitable program for them. The aim of designing the training program is to be an innovator in coaching children in elementary school in order to increase their opportunities for achieving sports excellence at every level. Furthermore, from the researcher experience who taught for five years found out lack for available standards and curriculum that guide teachers and coaches to teach young athletes in Kuwait public schools. Limitations of the study 1) The study will be limited to designing program for only Kuwait elementary school. 2) Time will also be a constraint to this study since the children are expected to attend class as well as learn the new program in the field. 3) The study will only include male pupils' in the public elementary schools. 4) The program will be designed only for less than 50 student's teachers. 5) The duration for applying the program is 40 minutes five working days for eight weeks. CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW Providing training programs for anyone regardless of age, skill or gender is significant. Varied literatures have attempted to examine the way developing athletic talent is crucial not only for psychological fitness but also developing a competitive team (Mackinnon, 87). They have also made significant efforts of revealing the way training and developing a competitive team is a long term training process. This is because it starts from learning up to competing level; thus training elementary school children of age 6-11 will enable the coaches to develop a competitive team in the future. McCallie (56) argues that building a fierce competitive athletic team requires the coaches to start training children earlier on how to think and focus on making correct decisions in life. Thus, training children on skill development will offer them opportunities to become competitive players at the competition level. Training involves various aspects and approaches which are systematic in relation to the level of skills. The fundamental skills are critical in ensuring the trainee acquires the required spirit towards realizing the final goal. From this perspective, it is important to understand the athlete to provide the best training program to improve the skill tremendously. The basic training is equally important to advanced methods of training athletes to ensure agility is acquired and goal is accomplished. Similarly, this applies also in children undertaking training in the athletics. For instance plyometric training is considered an effective method of training champion athletes from different parts of the world. On the other hand, it faces critism based on misconceptions especially in children. Plyometric training entails forcing sudden contraction of muscles from a wholly stretch (Pence, 2012.). The training is associated with risks however with proper coaching and provision skills in the field can culminate in remarkable gains. Introducing the raining among children should be gradually to facilitate systematic adoption of the exercise resulting to brilliant outcome (Poliquin, 2012). Strength training exercises for youngsters plays a significant role in keeping children fit not only physically but also psychologically. Although this kind of training is characterized by mixed reactions from coaches especially for kids from different parts of the world it culminates remarkable results. The training involves various activities aimed at improving specific skills among kid. Notably, the training is highly provided to children over 7 years (Coaching Kids Sports Information & Sport, 2012). Similarly to other training programmes strength training entails systematic stages towards advanced levels of training. The training is highly associated with application of weighted resistance to undertake training. On the other hand, endurance is another form of training program that entails enabling the body to perform past a continued period. The training program is characterized by both aerobic and anaerobic training. The training is highly applied in various sports to boost fitness and promoting psychological aspects among the kids (Coaching Kids Sports Information & Sport, 2012). Endurance training is in cooperated in almost every training activity. From this perspective, the program is critical and its paramount in improving the child body aimed at maintaining fitness. Birrer and Morgan (79) also argue that psychological and physical skills training will enhance the performance of athletes in high competitive sports. Every child will be taught on how to become a competitive winner. The children will be coached every day for one to two hours in order to develop effective skills vital for sports competitive advantage. They will also be taught the significant of training to win and encouraged not to give up in case they fail in athletics (McCallie, 47). Therefore, the coach will mentor children psychologically on how they will become competitors in the final sports. The world has become truly competitive in nearly all aspects and extra efforts are required to overcome the ever increasing competition in the society. The situation is not different among children across different age groups around the globe (Committee on Sports Medicine and Fitness 2012). The athletics is one of the core aspects that can be regarded highly competitive and parents are providing an avenue for overcome it through training programs. This has become the basis of creating champions as well as enabling children to realize other goals in life. However, various approaches can be deployed to realize the goals of enhancing the competitiveness of a child in the athletic world. The following highlights the various aspects of training suitable to children; strength training which involves coaching children to utilize their weight (Coaching Kids Sports Information & Sport, 2012). For the implementers of the program to succeed in this, they ought to have the following skills. According to Mahoe (2007), the coaches must have a clear outline of the message they want to pass. They must also know who it intended for as well as when, why and where the message delivery must be done. They should learn the appropriate kinesics and proxemics in relaying the message. This is especially difficult in children and therefore, extreme care must be taken. Coaches should also strive to maximize the potential of the young athletes by knowing how to operate with the weaknesses of the young children (Athletics, 1985). In working with young children, the coaches should criticize without offending (Athletics, 1985). In this case, they should therefore take into consideration the demographic aspects of each individual child. The coaches should also know all that appertains to the sport other than the basic rules. Research Methodology The research will apply mixed methods in order to determine whether designing a training program in track and field skills for elementary school athletes is beneficial. It is expected to use quantitative research through applying questionnaire that will evaluate the researcher to collect much data. In other words, we aim to gain wider data (quantitative) via the use of questioannaires; qualitative data is going to be gathered through interviews in order to provide more in-depth data. The researcher then is going to match both data quantitative and qualitative data to reach better understanding of aimed problem. This is because the quantitative research will enable the collection of much data. The researcher will apply different types of athletic skills in one day rather than using the traditional methods that use one type a day only. Data Analysis The researcher will analyze the data through interpreting the gathered data. Descriptive statistics will enable the research to measure the variability of the established trend; thus providing a clear picture of data collected. Alternatively, the researcher will analyze data through narrative approached from case studies; thus making deductions from data collected. This will be comprehensively evaluated for hypotheses and related outcomes from the sampled population. Conclusions Although skill-training programmes are vital for psychological health, designing a training program in track and field skills for ages 6-11 years old will significantly advance the athletics skills of children and increase their opportunities for achieving competing teams in sports. Therefore, this project will be significant because it will improve the track and field skills of Kuwait elementary children; thus enabling them to achieve a competitive advantage in high competition sports. Literature has indicated the way training children are crucial not only for psychological and physical health but also for enabling children to discover their talents. Thus, employing quantitative methodology will enable the researcher to determine whether designing a training program in track and skills for elementary school athletes is beneficial in a wider way. Works Cited Athletics: Children in Sport Coaching Programme. Parkside, S. Aust: ACHPER, 1985. Print. Birrer, D, and G Morgan. "Psychological Skills Training As a Way to Enhance an Athlete's Performance in High-Intensity Sports." Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports. 20 (2010): 78-87. Print. Mackinnon, Kevin. A Healthy Guide to Sport: How to Make Your Kids Healthy, Happy and Ready to Go. Oxford [England: Meyer & Meyer Sport, 2005. Print. McCallie, Joanne P. Choice Not Chance: Rules for Building a Fierce Competitor. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley, 2012. Print. McEwan, Harry E. K, and Barry C. Andrews. Teaching Physical Education, Human Movement and Fitness in High Schools. Cape Town: Nasou, 1988. Print. Robertson, Lawson. Modern Athletics: How to Train for the Various Events of the Track and Field Programme. New York, London: C. Scribner's Sons, 1932. Print. Pence, Erik. Plyometric Training - Is it Safe for Children? 2012. Web. Coaching Kids Sports Information & Sport. Kids Training Programs. 2012. Web. Hatcher, Tina. Athletic Training for Kids. 2010. Web. Poliquin, Charles. Plyometrics for Kids: The Risks Versus the Benefits of the Powerful Training Tool. 2012. Web. Kraemer, William & Fleck, Steven. Strength Training for Young Athletes. New York: Human Kinetics. 2005. Print. Committee on Sports Medicine and Fitness. American Academy of Pediatrics: Intensive Training and Sports Specialization in Young Athletes. 2012. Print. Coaching Kids Sports Information & Sport. Endurance Training for Kids. 2012. Web. Coaching Kids Sports Information & Sport. Strength Training Exercises for Kids. 2012. Web. Read More